In the spirit of orientation, it’s time for introductions.
We are Mast Media, your on-campus student-produced news source. Mast Media is the converged efforts of The Mooring Mast — Pacific Lutheran University’s award winning student newspaper — and Mast Student Television, the on-campus video production learning lab. Mast Student Television and The Mooring Mast have been around for a pretty long time — 41 and 90 years respectively, but more on that in a minute. However, like many of you, we’re also trying to find our place on campus.
Two years ago, The Mast and Mast TV operated as separate endeavors. Every week The Mast published a new edition of the paper and the TV station would air an episode of News@Nine, the weekly news show. The two outlets worked independently to assign, produce and publicize content. Eventually, we decided to pool our resources, embarking on last school year’s trial run of merged production. In that time, we’ve experimented with how to best serve an active campus with diverse needs, as well as foster a sustainable method of participation in student media.And that’s where Mast Media was born.
From this point forward, all content created by both The Mast and Mast TV can be found on one website, https://mastmedia.plu.edu. Here you’ll also find classroom content under the LuteTimes header, as well as plenty of online-only content that is updated daily. We’re no longer a once-a-week production. The print issue will still come out Friday morning and News@Nine will still air news every Thursday at 9 p.m. But when something happens Friday night, you won’t have to wait seven days to hear about it from student media. For more information on our website, check out this introduction by our online editor, Leah Traxel.
Another new addition this year is our Business section, where we will both inform you of national trends and provide insight on resources you can use during your inevitable job hunt. For more on the new section, check out this piece by our business editor, Bjorn Slater.
This issue of The Mast hopes to serve as your introduction to campus. It’s a little shorter in length than our standard issues, which will start to hit stands Sept. 20, will be. But we aim for all of our content to be of use to everyone within the PLU community, from clubs to get involved with on campus to how to talk to your academic adviser or how to be a great Lute fan. Beyond the website and new potential for content, The Mast is celebrating a milestone this year: 90 years of publication. In the upcoming year, we will be celebrating our anniversary with all of you. We’re hoping our makeover and updates ensure at least another 90 years of serving this community.
If you’d like to get involved with Mast Media, please be in touch. There is information on our website, https://mastmedia.plu.edu, as well as on our Facebook page, about how to volunteer, get paid, place an ad, share a tip or write a letter to the editor. Don’t hesitate to contact us via email at mast@plu.edu or masttv@plu.edu for more information, either.
And if you just want to follow along, that’s great too. You can find us on Twitter at several different usernames, including @PLUMast and @maststudenttv.
Welcome #newlutes and #welcomehomelutes. We are excited to call you our audience, and we sincerely hope our place on campus continues to be on your screens and in your hands.
